


Fast As You Can

by kuronoir



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Drug Abuse, M/M, Memory Loss
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-10
Updated: 2014-05-15
Packaged: 2018-01-24 05:34:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1593425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuronoir/pseuds/kuronoir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve goes off to war and glory and leaves Bucky alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first fic in years. If anyone is interested, I'll definitely write more ( I only have a vague idea where this is going but I'm sure I'll think of something)
> 
> Also come say hi on [tumblr](http://alpharagnar.tumblr.com)

Steve really did it. His pig headed determination to join up finally paid off. His dream, to defend his country was finally coming true. Bucky couldn’t be more proud of his best friend. It was never Bucky's dream. Bucky never really wanted much, mostly just wanted to see Steve smile. Steve though, Steve was determined to see the world, and now he was.

 

He’s not really sure how he managed it. Bucky always knew that Steve would make an amazing soldier if all you needed was a strong moral compass, fierce determination, and a brilliant mind.  Steve had all those things, but he also was the most physically frail man Bucky had ever met. It was the one thing Bucky could beat him at. Bucky was strong and Bucky was good at getting people to like him. Steve though, he’d had two battles with pneumonia last winter alone. he almost didn’t make it. Bucky sat with him every night terrified that his best friend would die in the night.

 

That didn’t deter him though. As soon as he could get out of bed, he was straight down to the recruitment office. But this time, for some reason, they said yes.

 

Bucky couldn’t believe it, he’d always assumed it was just another one of those things that Steve did that made him love him even more. Like when he would try to face down three guys twice his size for speaking rudely to a woman in a bar. Of course Bucky would swoop in at the last minute and kick their asses. Not because he gave a shit about some broad, but anyone lays a hand on Steve has it coming.

 

And that was how it always was, but this, this was real, he was really leaving. And Bucky couldn't swoop in and save him this time. You can’t save someone from the army, you just have to watch them go and hope they come home to you.

 

So that’s what Bucky did, he waited.

 

Of course, the months go by so slowly when you have nothing to do. So, he goes to new bars, new parties, makes new friends who call him Jim and everything is wrong, but there’s always another bottle, or another broad (or another boy, but he tries to keep that quiet because people don't understand that kind of thing), and for a little while he feels almost like he’s not alone.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He doesn’t hear much from Steve. For a little while the letters were almost constant.  Steve gushing with enthusiasm so much that his usually neat print would nearly slant off the page by the end of the letter. Every letter ended the same though, “I miss you”, he’d write, as if to apologize. Bucky would smile reading that each time, and scoff.

 

He has no idea.

 

Sometimes they are just Steve worrying about Bucky, hoping he’s eating and keeping himself out of too much trouble, and that’s just the worst. It’s Buckys job to worry about Steve, it’s always been that way, and dammit that’s how it’ll always be between them. So what Steve’s a soldier now, Bucky knows he’s just some kid from Brooklyn who never backed down from a fight and always had the bruises and broken bones to show for it. And if Bucky can’t be there to protect him from the bullies he’s running into in the army, he at least should be allowed to be the one to write worried letters.

 

“Of course I’m eating, idiot.” is all he writes back.

 

Then the letters slow down, becoming more and more infrequent and containing fewer and fewer details. No more amusing stories about flagpoles and stern brunettes. No more senseless and insulting worrying either. Mostly the letter just turn into long apologies.

 

“I miss you Bucky”

“I wish you were here with me Bucky”

“I can’t wait until I can see you again Bucky”

“I hope I can see you soon Bucky”

“Things aren’t the same with you not here Bucky”

 

Like Steve ever had something to be sorry for. Like Steve would ever have to apologize to Bucky. And Bucky can’t take it, because doesn’t Steve know that there’s nothing he wouldn’t suffer for him. He can’t see that anymore, so he stops writing back.

And Steve stops writing too.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s one day, after yet another party with the people who call him Jim,stumbling home in the early morning mist, when he passes a newsstand and sees on the cover, “Captain America in Germany!”, and it’s Steve, but it’s also not Steve. He’s a foot and a half taller and built like a log cabin instead of a twig, and he’s beautiful, and he looks happy, and it hurts. Bucky hates it. They stole his friend, changed him, gave him a new name.

 

But it’s more than that. This man is not his in that indefinable sense that Bucky still belongs t Steve. Captain America, it seems, belongs to the good ol’ U.S.A. Now millions of people see in him what Bucky saw all along. And that’s the worst of it, realizing that even if Steve comes home, he’ll never really come home and he’ll never belong to Bucky again. That they can never go back to the boys they used to be.

 

 

* * *

 

 

That night, he finds another party, and more people call him Jim, and he meets a man who is nothing like Steve and definitely nothing like “Captain America”. His name is Ryan, and he’s the life of the party, he practically has women swooning at his every word. Who wouldn’t though, he’s tall, and dark, and handsome, and he has great drugs, and tonight it seems, he only has eyes for Bucky.

 

It’s nice to be wanted, Bucky thinks. It’s not the same as Steve, Steve needed him, just like Bucky needed Steve right back. Now no one needs him, no one ever will, but Ryan wants him, and that has to count for something. It makes it a little easier at least.

 

They don’t go to bed that night, they just fuck, and smoke, and shoot up, and drink, and rinse and repeat. It’s amazing, Bucky doesn’t even think of Steve once.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He stays with Ryan, in his house, for days. Even when it’s just the two of them, it’s still a party. When he’s with Ryan he doesn’t have to feel anything but bliss. He almost likes the guy a little too.

 

He thinks it’s Wednesday, he knows it’s the middle of the afternoon from the shadows on the walls, he can’t see a clock from where he’s sprawled on the huge leather couch. He can’t remember the last time he left the house, it’s certainly been weeks, but Ryan keeps a steady supply of everything they’ll need delivered to his door. It’s definitely Wednesday, the groceries come on Wednesday, he remembers, and that’s them knocking on the door now. Ryan passes him on the way to the door with a quick slap to the ass.

 

“Get up!” he says too loudly.

 

Bucky just scoots up to the end of the couch to dig the stash out of the end table there. The man comes in with the groceries and Ryan goes back to wherever he was before. He smiles as he slips the needle into his arm. This is the only thing that’s keeping him sane these days. Dimly in the background he can hear the newscaster on the radio say something about Captain America being victorious in his latest battle in Germany. He realizes that it doesn’t hurt so much now, to think of Steve, of his apologies. He is aware that Steve would hate what he’s become. The man he’s made himself into. Jim. But he needs this, and Steve would understand, he’d probably apologize again. But it’s not Steves fault, Steve who only wanted to save the world. Bucky had to let him go, but letting him go means letting go of the world until nothing hurts.

  
And then, there’s nothing at all.

 


	2. I Miss You, But I Haven't Met You Yet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi over at [ tumblr](http://www.alpharagnar.tumblr.com)

 

Steve hasn’t slept in days. It feels more like weeks really, but the job (this part of it where he actually get to earn that title, “Captain”) sometimes calls for it. It’s really better this way, he thinks, when he sleeps he sees the dead eyes of fallen friends, he sees the mangled corpses of his enemies. He has nightmares about failing, about everyone finding out that he really is a fraud, that he has no idea if he’s doing this right. Mostly though, when he dreams, he sees home; he sees Bucky. He dreams of that skinny kid he once was and the boy who was his hero, his inspiration; and then he wakes up, and it’s all mud and bitter coffee and weary men and sometimes it’s just too much to take. So, he just stays awake, and finds things to do to occupy his mind. It’s why his shield is always gleaming bright, he polishes it almost obsessively. Sometimes he plays solitaire, or he might do push-ups until even his serum enhanced arms grow tired. He doesn’t draw so much anymore. All the figures started to look like him after awhile, and he avoids reading because he’s started seeing Bucky in all the characters on the page.

 

He couldn’t write to Bucky anymore either. What was there to say. After the serum, after he became, this, he knew that things were never going to be the same. He did it all the same, because this was his dream, what he’s always wanted to do, to fight for what’s right and good; but still, when he emerged from that chamber a new man, it felt like someone had died too.

 

His letters to Bucky had become increasingly mopey anyway. Not having anymore fun stories to tell him, all he could think of to say was how badly he missed him, and then, when he received the serum, he couldn’t tell him anything at all. But Bucky would know, Captain America was on the cover of every newspaper back home. Bucky would see, and he would know that Steve had done what needed to be done. This was the only way Steve was ever going to be able to be any good to anyone anyway. As Captain America, he had a voice and he had the strength to do some real good; but sometimes, when he allowed his mind to wander, back to the streets of Brooklyn, back to the man who was his hero, he wondered, what was the cost?

 

 

* * *

 

 

The letter came from someone he didn’t know, someone named Ryan who apparently was now friends with someone named Jim. Jim who was in a hospital, in a coma from a drug overdose. Jim whose only possessions were some clothes and stacks of letters addressed to Steve Rogers.

 

Steve just stood there awhile and stared. This cant be right, he thought, because Bucky is smarter than this, Bucky is invincible, and Bucky would never let someone call him Jim.

 

But it is him, Steve knows it, and that terrifies him.

 

The next several hours are a blur. He knows he’s never thrown his weight around quite so much before, and it’s scary to realize just how much influence Captain Rogers has that he is able to get himself on a plane back home in a matter of a few hours.  He almost feels bad, but can’t quite bring himself to care.  He must sleep on the plane for a bit, blessedly dreamless, because he remembers taking off, and he remembers landing and nothing in between.

 

As soon as his feet hit solid ground again he’s running, straight to the car the army had arranged for him, which takes him to the hospital. He gets to the front door and freezes. He’s been on autopilot, he hasn’t really processed what is going on.  Much slower now, he pushes through the doors and makes his way to the room he’s been told is housing his best friend.

 

He enters the room and sees that Bucky is awake. He almost breathes a sigh of relief but holds off when he gets a good look at him. Frankly, he looks terrible. His hair unshorn and unwashed, face, pale and sunken, his eyes stare off at a point on the wall unseeing. He looks like a complete stranger. He looks as different from the man that he remembers from mere months ago, as Captain America must look from scrawny Steve Rogers. He almost feels like an intruder here.

 

“Bucky” Steve whispers, hesitating because he’s not really sure how to have this conversation.

 

Bucky slowly blinks and turns his head, “Bucky?” He says it like a question, like he’s tasting the word for the first time. Then after a moment, “Do I know you?”

 

Steve tilts his head confused, “What do you mean, I mean, I know I look different now, but you’ve gotta know who I am right.”, panic is edging into his words towards the end, because Bucky just has this frustrated, sad look on his face that says everything for him.

 

“No, I- I’m sorry, It’s just that, well, I don’t remember much, of anything.”

 

A stone settles in the pit of Steves stomach, and it’s all he can do to keep himself from losing it right there. How bad must this overdose have been. Amnesia?  He takes a step closer, not really knowing what to say.

 

“Bucky, I-” He can’t finish, just sighs and reluctantly takes a step back. “I’ll be right back” he says quietly as he steps from the room. He feels like a coward but he just wasn’t prepared for this, this is more than anyone could have been prepared for.

 

As soon as he closes the door behind him, he sees a man stride around the corner moving towards him with purpose. He’s tall, nearly as tall as Steve, his face is handsome, but he’s clearly seen better days.

 

“Oh thank god you’re here, you’re Steve right!”, he pauses and seems to think for a moment, scrutinizing Steves face. He knows the drill here, he’s been recognized out of the suit before. “Shit, man, you’re Captain America!”

 

“And you are” Steve’s not feeling particularly generous right now, after learning that his best friend doesn’t know him anymore, he’s running on a bit of a short fuse. Right now he doesn’t have time to be Captain America.

 

“Oh right, yeah, I’m Ryan. I sent you the letter. Oh my god I sent a letter to Captain America!”

 

Steve really wants to punch this guy. Instead he says, “What happened?”

 

“Well, you know, Jim and I-”

 

“Bucky.”

 

“What?”

 

“His name is Bucky, not Jim, he hates Jim”

 

“Alright, Bucky and I, well, we’ve been hanging out for a few weeks now. He came to one of my parties a few weeks back and just, never left. It’s cool, I really like him and it seemed like he could really use a friend you know.”

 

And that stings a bit, knowing that Bucky was going through something, needed a friend, needed Steve, and Steve wasn’t there for him.

 

“Anyway, we were just partying and, well I guess he took a little too much. He was sad you know,  and he didn’t seem to know how to stop.”

 

“Wait,” Steve is getting upset now, “the drugs he took, he got them from you?”

 

“Well.. I mean...” he hesitates, “I didn’t give them to him, they were just kinda, there. He always wanted to get high, and I didn’t know how to make him stop. He never listened to me.  I felt really bad, but I just couldn’t get through to him.”

 

He’s making excuses now. He’s guilty, and he’s not telling Steve the whole story. There’s no way Bucky would be like that. Never. Doesn’t matter though, because Steve’s heard enough.

 

“Get out.”

 

“What?”

 

“I said get out. You need to leave right now before I do something I may regret later.”

 

“O- Okay, I get it.” He lingers for a second “Just, I never wanted to hurt him. I know I should have been better to him, never let him stick around, but he was so alone, I couldn’t say no.” Steve just glares at him harder, before returning to Buckys room and closing the door.

 

“Was that Ryan.” Bucky said, his voice was so small.

 

“Do you remember him.” Steve asked. He felt a more than a little upset at the idea that Bucky could remember that scumbag (he’s not really a scumbag, Steve knows that, but he’s also allowed to be angry right now too) and not him.

 

“No. I just met him. Well, I met him awhile ago, but he’s just been the only one here besides the nurses. He told me I was living with him. He said- he said we were lovers.” Bucky looks at him, question in his eyes, uncertain of the words.

 

At that, Steves mouth goes completely dry. “Did he now” Steve tries to remain neutral, while his mind is screaming at him to find Ryan and beat him to a pulp.

 

“So” Bucky interrupts his rage fantasy, clearly uncomfortable “How do I know you? I’m sorry, it’s just-”

 

And how do you even answer that question. We are the only people in each others lives that we give a damn about and who give a damn about us or You were the man that inspired me to want to save the world. Of course, all Steve wants to say is, I love you and I swear I’ll never leave you again, but that might be a bit too much. Instead he says, “We’ve been friends for a very long time, best friends”

 

“Cool,” Bucky trails off, eyes drawn back to that spot on the wall, and then, “I’m glad you came. I’m sorry I don’t remember you”

 

“There’s no where else I could be right now” And Steve has to dig his fingers so hard in his palm to keep from crying. Because he can’t, not now. The world can wait, right now he has to save Bucky.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s not that he couldn’t remember anything when he woke up. He knew, for example, that he was in New York, that this was where he’d been his whole life. It’s just that any details about that life were lost on him. They told him his name was Jim, but that sounded wrong. He must have been called something else before. Not Jim, he hates Jim. And that’s the other thing, he’s not a blank slate. He knows what he likes, what he doesn’t. He knows that Ryan is not really who he wants to be visiting him here, (though he also knows he likes men). He knows he has no family. He knows alot of things. But nothing specific enough to really know who he is.

 

Ryan tells him there were a bunch of letters with his things. He says he knows someone named Steve Rogers in the army and that he had sent him a letter asking him if he could help in any way.  He’s glad for it, not being anyone is really difficult. He feels alone all the time. He’s latched onto Ryan since he’s the only person who comes to see him besides the nurses and apparently they’ve been in a relationship.

 

The doctors tell him that he’d had a drug overdose and that he was suffering from brain damage as a result of that.  They say he may recover his memory with time, but that he may never quite be that same. That’s okay, he thinks, he’s not too sure he wants to be the person he was before if he was so miserable that he’d OD on heroin.  

 

He asks Ryan about it, and he says that they used to do it together sometimes, but that Jim was sad, and felt lonely, even in a room full of people, and that he often sought the escape that getting high gave him, he craved it.  Ryan doesn’t know why, he says that Jim never told him much about his past, or where he came from, says that it was never really like that between them, that they were just having fun.  Jim (that still feels wrong) asks why he’s been here then, keeping him company this whole time.

 

“Well, I just feel bad for you I guess”

 

And that really hurts, he knows he doesn’t like to be pitied. He asks Ryan to leave after that. He still comes back the next day and the day after that so he can't be that bad of a guy.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Sometimes, for no particular reason he knows of, Jim becomes totally overwhelmed and upset. Nothing in particular is going on, but he suddenly will become angry or just burst into tears. Mostly though, he just sits and thinks. Tries not to think about anything in the hopes that maybe when he's not expecting he'll just stumble across a memory. It hasn't happened yet, but at least staring at the wall he doesn't have to think about anything at all. Doesn't have to worry about working himself up into a panic over that strange drifting lonely sensation he feels when he is confronted with the reality that he doesn't know who the hell he actually is.

 

He's excited for Steve to contact them. From the letters (Ryan wasn't sure he should read them, but Jim has insisted) he could tell that  relationship he had with Steve, they were extremely close. The tone of the letters was usually anything but casual.

 

He wondered how he had responded,  if he had at all. He wondered how he had a relationship with Ryan if there was this man away at war who cared for him so deeply. What kind of person did that. Ryan told him they hadn't really been together long, but still it felt like betrayal, nothing about his relationship with Ryan felt right. He wasn’t a bad guy, in fact most of the time he liked him, but there were no real romantic feelings there.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Of course, when Steve actually shows up (he hadn’t expected that) Jim has no idea what to do. He hears him in the doorway, he’s aware of him just standing there silently for a moment, but he can’t quite bring himself to look until he hears his voice, quietly,

 

“Bucky”

 

And it’s not a name he recognizes, he’s never heard it before. But as soon as he hears it from this mans lips, he knows; Jim is not his name, he is Bucky. It feels strange, not like he’s remembering anything specific, but he remembers the feeling he got everytime he heard that name spoken from those lips and he suddenly feels more settled than he has since he woke up.  He repeats it back to him “Bucky?” and looks at the man who came to see him.

 

He’s sure it’s Steve, but he asks anyway, it feels rude not to ask. Apparently however he shouldn't have since apparently no one told him about the memory loss and that’s just idiotic of Ryan to not include that in the letter that got this man to pick up and race from the front lines to be here. Jim (Bucky, his name is Bucky) feels like he’s been stabbed in the chest at the look that Steve gives him when he confirms that he really has no idea who he is. He looks lost, he looks like someone died, and he can’t bear that he’s put that look on this mans face, so he says nothing when Steve practically runs from the room, all tension and panic.

 

Through the door, he barely hears a muffled conversation. He allows himself to drift away again though, because Steve will help him. He knows it. Steve knows who he really is, and Steve loves him.

 

That’s when he hears through the door, Steve rather sternly telling someone to leave, before moments later re-entering the room.

 

Bucky guesses that the other person must have been Ryan, and from Steves stormy expression, their conversation hadn’t gone well.  He decides to test the waters a bit and reveals to Steve that he and Ryan had been lovers.  Steves eyes glaze over and he suddenly is flushed from his neck up.

 

Of course he decides to prod a little further,

 

“How do I know you? I’m sorry, it’s just-” he trails off not really sure how to apologize for something he has no memory of doing.

 

Steve takes a long pause, clearly mulling over whether or not to spill his guts to Bucky, to tell him what he really feels. What he all but said in every letter that Bucky read from him. What every tick of his face and every terrified glance. What’s so obvious now to Bucky that he’s seeing this man and is already falling in love with him without even knowing him. What his heart beating rabbit quick in his chest is saying.

 

Of course he doesn’t tell Bucky that he loves him. He skirts it, because he’s afraid. And Bucky is too, because everything is new and scary right now, but that axis that it all seems to be spinning on, the true north is clearly Steve Rogers, that much he knows for sure

 

So he’s resolved, he wants to really remember this man, he has to because how else can he deserve the deep affection he holds towards him. So he looks away again, because it still feels strange to feel so connected to someone and not even know who they are. To be able to read every expression and nuance in body language of someone his brain says is a total stranger.  

 

So he looks at the wall, but this time he’s got Steves face in his mind.

 

“Cool” he says, “I’m glad you came. I’m sorry I don’t remember you” It’s a weak apology, but he can’t seem to find the words yet that he really wants to say.

 

“There’s no where else I could be right now” Steve replies. And with that he feels content, to just be in his presence, it’s enough to calm his fearful mind.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, this is where I've run out of plot... it may be a bit before I have more worked up, so if you have suggestions where you'd like this to go, I'm all ears. Also, if anyone wants to beta I'm a terrible editor I'm afraid.


End file.
